Department of Commerce Archives - Page 2 of 11

US Scallop Association advocates for competitive tariff rates

June 15, 2018 — When members of the American Scallop Association went to Washington last week to take in in the annual NOAA Fish Fry, the trade group used the opportunity to hand a letter to Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross.

In the letter, the ASA asks Ross for help in making their product more competitive for European exports. Specifically, the group cited the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement, which the ASA claimed puts U.S. scallop producers at an 8-percent disadvantage against Canadian competitors.

The group wants Ross to resume trade negotiations with EU members as soon as possible and lock in tariff rates that mirror those for Canadian products.

The letter was delivered at a time when U.S. trade is in turmoil. President Trump has discussed placing tariffs on products imported from China, Canada and European allies, and in turn, leaders from those countries have threatened similar actions against U.S. goods.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

American Scallop Association Delivers Letter to Wilbur Ross, Participates in NOAA Fish Fry

June 11, 2018 — WASHINGTON — The following was released by the American Scallop Association:

American Scallop Association (ASA) leadership traveled to Washington last Wednesday to participate in the 43^rd Annual NOAA Fish Fry. In Washington, they hand-delivered a letter to Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross regarding current issues facing the American scallop industry.

“This is the fourth year that we have participated in the NOAA Fish Fry,” said ASA General Counsel, Attorney John Whiteside. “Attending the NOAA Fish Fry gives us the opportunity to interact with policy-level decision makers on the domestic and global issues that affect us most.”

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross visits the ASA tent at the NOAA Fish Fry.

In the letter, they outline several issues currently affecting the domestic, U.S. wild-caught, Atlantic sea scallop industry, including a request to restart the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership negotiations due to international price undercutting issues.

Specifically, as a result of the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA), the Canadian scallop industry now operates at an 8 percent advantage over its American counterpart. The agreement gives Canadian-based companies an unfair advantage in their exports to the European Union, making U.S. prices uncompetitive.

“The ASA had a discussion focused on international trade with US Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross about how CETA-rigged prices are causing irreparable harm to US companies trying to export lobster and scallops to the EU,” said Attorney Whiteside. The ASA urged the Secretary to resume the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership negotiations as soon as possible and be steadfast in demanding that tariff rates for fishery products like scallops and lobster mirror those set in the CETA treaty.”

ASA General Counsel, John Whiteside, delivers letter to Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross.

ASA members buy and sell over 75 percent of U.S. Atlantic sea scallops landed annually and are leaders in the domestic and international sea scallop trade. Headquartered along the Eastern Seaboard, members employ over 4,000 people throughout their domestic and international operations.

The NOAA Fish Fry gives industry representatives the opportunity to draw awareness to issues facing fisheries across the cuntry while bringing industry stakeholders and top government officials together under one roof. This year, ASA members were visited by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, and President Trump’s nominee to head NOAA, Barry Myers. ASA members are NOAA Fish Fry regulars, and have represented the scallop industry for years at the event. ASA members that attended the event include: John F. Whiteside, Jr., Ross Paasche, Joseph Furtado, Paul Joly, Master Chef George Karousos, Barbara Cournoyer, Brittany Bushee, and Steve Zevitas.

ASA General Counsel, John Whiteside, meets with Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross.

Read the letter to Secretary Ross here

About the American Scallop Association

The ASA was founded in 1992 to foster a better public understanding of the importance of the scallop industry and to represent and promote the interests of the domestic, U.S. wild-caught, Atlantic sea scallop industry. Its aim is to support ASA members and all other affiliated interests to ensure a viable and long-term future for the Atlantic sea scallop fishery through effective dialogue, consultation, collaboration and partnerships.

Zinke says Interior reorganization still on track in speech at Fort Peck

May 22, 2018 — FORT PECK, Mont. — It wasn’t a Sunday sermon, but those who skipped church to hear Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke speak at Fort Peck Dam nonetheless received a parable — of two fish.

Zinke, a former Montana U.S. representative, told attendees that changes were underway to stop government agencies from offering differing views on matters like the environment or wildlife, differences that sandbag permitting of federal projects.

The fish, a trout and salmon, have become staples of the story, which Zinke, a Republican, has been telling since announcing a reorganizing of the Department of Interior.

“Imagine if you have a salmon and a trout in the same stream. Upstream you have a dam. Downstream you have irrigation and that stream passes by a Forest Service holding,” Zinke said. “It happens all the time. This is how our government manages our resources: The trout is managed by Fish and Wildlife Services through me. The salmon is Department of Commerce through NMFS (National Marine Fisheries Service). Upstream the water flow and temperature is often Army Corps of Engineers, except sometimes it’s BOR (Bureau of Reclamation).”

The government agencies pile up as the stream threads through a national forest and beyond.

Read the full story at the Billings Gazette

House committee passes act giving FWS authority over certain endangered species

May 18, 2018 — A U.S. House of Representatives committee has given its approval to a bill that proponents claim would eliminate redundancies in the Endangered Species Act and put the Fish and Wildlife Service in charge of safeguarding fish that migrate between fresh and ocean waters.

The Federally Integrated Species Health (FISH) Act passed the Natural Resources Committee on Wednesday, 16 May by a 22-14 vote. It now proceeds to the House floor.

Currently, endangered species responsibilities are shared between FWS, which resides in the Interior Department, and the National Marines Fisheries Service, which is under the purview of the Department of Commerce. U.S. Rep. Ken Calvert (R-California), the bill’s primary sponsor, said it doesn’t make sense for two agencies to share oversight.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Wilbur Ross Calls for Seafood Trade Surplus in Press Club Speech

May 15, 2018 — Yesterday in Washington, during a nationally televised event at the National Press Club and following his speech on U.S.-China trade policy, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross discussed his concerns and plans for the U.S. domestic fishing industry. Specifically, Sec. Ross wants to focus on reducing the U.S. seafood trade deficit, noting that over 80 percent on seafood consumed in the U.S. is imported. As part of this effort, Secretary Ross expressed the need to collaborate with the commercial fishing industry and for U.S. fisheries to achieve Maximum Sustainable Yield.

The Secretary’s full remarks are below:

As to fisheries, one of the great surprises to me both in the confirmation hearing and even more so now that I’m occupying this job has been the amount of congressional attention to fishing, especially to red snappers. I’ve spent so many months about the allocation of fishing capability between the commercial fishermen and the sport fishermen in the Gulf of Mexico that for a whole month I refused to eat any red snapper – I had more than had my fill of it every day. So fisheries are a very complicated area. Many, many, many species. Each one has a whole regulatory apparatus around it.

But I have one particular axe to grind, and that is more than 80% of our seafood consumed in the US is imported, and that seems a little bit silly to me given the coastlines we have and given everything else. So one of my objectives is to try to change that trade deficit into a trade surplus. It should be a thing that we’re very good at, it is a thing we’re very good at, and so we’re going to try to fix that. So that’s a very big preoccupation and I’ve been working a lot with the fisheries group and with the private sector on how to solve that problem.

A lot of the seafood being imported here is grown in aquaculture under conditions that would never be permitted for a US company. So it’s a kind of subsidy of them. There are also some health issues with some of those imports so we’re going to try to deal with that, and we’re also going to try to deal with how do we get to the maximum sustainable harvest in our waters, and how do we bring in selected elements of aquaculture done properly on our own part. So fisheries is a very complicated question but a very, very important one.

Listen to the remarks here.

Alabama Snapper Season of 47 Days Approved By NOAA

April 10, 2018 — The National Marine Fisheries Service [NMFS] has officially accepted Alabama’s plan to manage its own seasons for recreational red snapper fishing — paving the way for 47-day seasons in the next two years.

As Lagniappe has previously reported, the plan manages the season lengths in state and federal waters off the Alabama coast is part of a two-year pilot program approved by the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council in February.

For the first time in years, Gulf states will be able to manage recreational snapper fishing off their respective coasts through individual Exempted Fishing Permits (EFPs) submitted to NMFS.

The decision comes after years of shorter and shorter snapper seasons that frustrated anglers and commercial fisherman alike until a consortium of Gulf leaders negotiated a compromise through U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross that extended the 2017 season.

Gov. Kay Ivey announced Friday that Alabama’s plan, which will create a 47-day season, will be in place for the next two years. In 2018, it will run from June 1 to September 2 on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays and the entire week on the Fourth of July. It would run concurrently in state waters and in federal waters, which begin nine miles from the coast.

“I am very pleased that the U.S. Department of Commerce, through the National Marine Fisheries Service, has granted Alabama an Exempted Fishing Permit for the next two red snapper seasons,” Ivey said of the plan’s approval. “Following the directives from President Trump to cut down on federal regulations, this decision empowers Alabama to manage our resources instead of bureaucrats in Washington.”

Ivey also noted the EFP program was made possible by language Sen. Richard Shelby added to the FY2017 Commerce, Justice, and Science Appropriations bill. It directed the NMFS to develop the pilot program to allow states more control over reef fish management activities.

In a statement, Ivey said Alabama’s red snapper fishery is a big part of “the coastal culture and economy of” of the state and thanked Shelby and Rep. Bradley Byrne for their congressional efforts to give Alabama more autonomy in managing its coastal resources.

She also made a special note of the efforts Alabama is also indebted to Conservation and Natural Resources Commissioner Chris Blankenship made to push for alternatives to federal snapper seasons that had become shorter and shorter in recent years.

“The red snapper management granted by the EFP will allow Alabama to use the information from the Alabama Snapper Check Program, as well as the terabytes of fisheries data we have collected on the red snapper population in the Alabama Artificial Reef Zones, to show we can sustainably manage this fishery,” Blankenship said “I would like to thank Marine Resources Division Director Scott Bannon and Chief Biologist Kevin Anson for shepherding the permit request through the regulatory process.”

The federal charter season for red snapper is not included in Alabama’s new permit and is expected to be announced by NMFS sometime in April, though it is expected to be longer than the 2017 federal charter season, which stretched 49 days.

Ivey’s office said data collected through the Alabama Snapper Check Program the past four years was critical in securing the additional red snapper fishing days, and reminded fishermen they are still required to report their red snapper harvests through the program.

Only one report is required per vessel trip, and anglers can provide details via a smartphone app available under “Outdoor Alabama” in the iTunes or Google Play app stores; online at www.outdooralabama.com; or by paper forms available at select coastal public boat launches.

Read the full story at the Lagniappe Weekly

Response due from feds in lawsuit to end Atlantic monument

April 10, 2018 — PORTLAND, Maine — The federal government’s response to a lawsuit from fishermen trying to eliminate former President Barack Obama’s Atlantic Ocean monument is coming due.

The fishing groups sued to challenge the 2016 creation of the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument. The monument is a 5,000-square-mile area off of New England and is the first monument of its kind in the Atlantic Ocean.

A federal court ordered the U.S. Department of Commerce to respond to the lawsuit by April 16. It was filed at U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the New Jersey Herald

NOAA gives foreign fisheries 4 years to detail marine mammal protections

April 4, 2018 — The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has published a list of marine mammals at risk in 135 countries and given each foreign commercial fishery four years to report what harvesting practices are being employed to preserve the species, Mongabay, an environmental science and conservation news site, reports.

The list is born from a 2016 rule that grew out of a 2008 petition to the Department of Commerce brought by the Center for Biological Diversity and Turtle Island Restoration Network to halt the import of swordfish from countries where fishing methods put other animals in danger, the news service explains.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

Texas fisheries get disaster area declaration in wake of Hurricane Harvey

March 28, 2018 — Seven months after Hurricane Harvey devastated Texas, United States Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross has issued a national disaster declaration for the state’s commercial fishery.

The “commercial fishery disaster” designation will allow commercial fishermen in the state to receive federal funds and other assistance. The Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018 included USD 200 million (EUR 161 million) for fishery disasters declared by the U.S. Department of Commerce in calendar year 2017, and for fishery disasters resulting from Hurricanes Maria, Irma, and Harvey.

“The 2017 hurricane season was catastrophic for communities in Texas and for states along the Gulf of Mexico,” Ross said in a NOAA press release. “The Department of Commerce and the [p]resident are committed to working closely with Congress and the [s]tate of Texas to continue supporting recovery efforts for fishermen and local fishing businesses affected by the devastation wrought by Hurricane Harvey.”

Read the full story at Seafood Source

The Trump Administration Just Got Sued Over an “Unusual Mortality Event” in the Ocean

February 23, 2018 — On January 22, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration got word of a juvenile, North Atlantic right whale carcass floating off the coast of Virginia. Later identified as whale #3893, the 39-foot, 10-year-old female was towed to shore, where researchers examined her partially-decomposed remains. A few days later, preliminary necropsy findings indicated that the whale died of “chronic entanglement,” meaning it was caught in rope or line, according to a report from NOAA.

It was the first right whale to die in 2018, but it comes on the heels of the deaths of 17 right whales in the North Atlantic in 2017—a record setting number that is more than all right whale mortalities in the five previous years combined. NOAA researchers are calling the trend an “unusual mortality event”—a particularly concerning phenomenon, as North Atlantic right whales are an endangered species. There are only about 450 left in the wild, according to NOAA, and at the current rate, scientists predict the species could be functionally extinct in fewer than 25 years.

NOAA hasn’t determined the cause of the “unusual mortality event,” but some are looking right at Washington, and at NOAA itself. A new lawsuit, filed January 18 in US District Court in Washington, D.C., argues specifically that the Trump administration is at least partly responsible for failing to adequately address this epidemic.

Between 2010 and 2016, 85 percent of diagnosed whale deaths were the result of entanglement, typically in commercial fishing gear. The plaintiffs—the Center for Biological Diversity, Defenders of Wildlife, and the Humane Society—allege that President Trump’s Department of Commerce, of which NOAA is a branch, is in violation of the 1973 Endangered Species Act and the 1972 Marine Mammal Protection Act over their management of the North Atlantic lobster fishery, which “frequently entangles right whales,” according to the suit. Under the Endangered Species Act, the plaintiffs point out, any action, direct or indirect, by a federal agency must not be “likely to jeopardize” any endangered or threatened species.

Read the full story at Mother Jones